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Chapter 8: Life, Death and Love

I have heard about a man. He was once presented to the governor-general in India because he was a man of rare memory. He knew only one language, Rajasthani Hindi. He was a poor man, uneducated, but if you told him anything in any language, he would never forget it. He would repeat it like a parrot, not knowing what it meant.

He was called to the governor-general’s palace; the governor-general was surprised to hear about his capacity. Thirty other persons were called, and in thirty languages they uttered a few sentences. It was arranged in the following manner: the man went to one person, the first, and the first person said the first word of a sentence. Then he went to another person and he said the first word of his sentence, in another language. Then he went to the third. In this way he went to thirty people. Then he went back to the first who said his second word. And in this way again - it took many rounds, many hours. And then he repeated all the sentences separately.

The governor-general was simply puzzled. He could not believe it. But this man went mad.

This much memory is dangerous. Three types of people are almost always idiotic. Too much memory is not a good sign: it simply says that you have a very mechanical mind, it is not a sign of intelligence. Hence you hear so many stories of absent-mindedness about great scientists, philosophers. They are not people of great memory. Great intelligence has nothing to do with great memory. Memory is mechanical, intelligence is non-mechanical. They are totally different.

So don’t be worried, it is good. The memory is relaxing, many things will disappear, space will be created in you. And in that space you will be able to become more brilliant, more intelligent, more understanding. Intelligence means understanding; memory means a quality, a mechanical quality of repetition. Parrots have good memories. Don’t be worried about your memory. In the beginning it happens because you have accumulated much rubbish. When you meditate that rubbish starts disappearing, falling away.

“.and I feel myself a stupid child.” That is the way, the way to the kingdom of God. Lao Tzu says: Be like an idiot in this world so that you can understand the illogical ways of Tao. Jesus says: Be like a child - because only those who are like children will be able to enter into the kingdom of God. Don’t be worried about those things; the nonessential is dropping away. Feel happy and grateful. Once the rubbish has dropped, the real will arise; with the nonessential gone, the essential will arise. This is the way to reach to one’s own source.

But many times you will get scared because you are losing your grip on whatsoever you have valued up till now. But I can tell you only one thing: I have traveled the same path and have passed through the same phases. They are phases, they come and go. And your consciousness will become more and more purified, virgin, pure, uncorrupted. That uncorrupted consciousness is godliness.